1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to cargo shipping platforms or carts mounted on wheels, and more particularly, to cargo carts capable of being selectively attached to a hydraulic lift gate on a delivery truck.
2. Description of the Related Art
Today, airline companies transport cargo in large containers capable of being efficiently transported in the fuselage of their airplanes. Typically, the cargo is first transported by truck to the airline company's loading dock located at the airport where it is manually sorted and placed inside a cargo container. The cargo container is then loaded onto the airplane. The cargo container is then flown to the airport located near the cargo's final destination. When the cargo container arrives at the airport, it is unloaded from the airplane and transported to the airline company's unloading dock. There, the cargo is manually removed from the cargo container and placed in a truck and delivered to its final destination.
In a previously filed U.S. patent application (Ser. No. 07/981,826), the inventor disclosed a cargo container cart designed to be used with a half-size or full-size cargo containers commonly used today in the air cargo industry. The cart container cart was specifically designed to overcome many of the problems that, until then, had prevented such cargo containers from being used inside and between businesses. More particularly, the cart container cart enabled companies to load and unload containers more efficiently.
One drawback with using such cargo container carts, as well as other types of carts, was that they could not be used efficiently at locations that did not have loading docks. As a result, any cargo had to be manually moved between the ground and the truck bed using a hydraulic lift gate or an attachable ramp.
Since many business use delivery trucks having hydraulic lift gates, the invention disclosed herein is designed to provide a lift gate cargo cart that can be selectively and securely attached to a hydraulic lift gate to enable cargo to be efficiently loaded and unloaded from the delivery truck.